How Satya Nadella has got Achhe Din to Microsoft

Satya Nadella has completed 5 years as Microsoft CEO this week. The India-born Nadella can be credited for transforming Microsoft during these past five years. Microsoft was exactly not in great shape when he took over in 2014. The company was struggling in smartphone business and its other products like Zune and Kin were big flops. Windows 8, released around the same time, too received a subdued reception in the market. Here’s how Satya Nadella turned things around brought Achhe Din to the Redmond giant:

1.Revenue increased by almost $25 billion, surpassing $100 billion in July 2018

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Microsoft’s revenue increased from $86.73 billion (in fiscal year 2014) to $110.18 billion in last fiscal (in FY2018). Microsoft’s revenue exceeded $100 billion for the first time in fiscal year 2018. “We had an incredible year, surpassing $100 billion in revenue as a result of our teams’ relentless focus on customer success and the trust customers are placing in Microsoft,” Nadella said in a statement.

2.Market cap has jumped by almost $500 billion under Nadella

Microsoft’s stock price is one of the biggest proof of CEO Nadella’s success.

3.Microsoft closed FY2018 with record-high revenue and profit

Microsoft finished off a record fiscal year 2018 by hitting an all-time high on both revenue and profit front. During the fourth quarter, the company posted net profit of $8.8 billion, an increase of 35% percent year-over-year; net profit touched $30.3 billion for the year.

4.Gets cool quotient

After the mishaps on smartphones and other devices, Nadella focussed on the services aspect of Microsoft. That is, he wanted customers to use Microsoft tools and service regardless of the devices — and this seems to have worked.

5.Has emerged as cloud computing giant

One of Nadella’s biggest focus areas has been Microsoft’s cloud platform, Azure. Today, Azure is the second-largest cloud services company after Amazon’s AWS. Microsoft also competes with IBM, Google’s parent Alphabet and Alibaba in this space.

6.Befriended Linux operating system

Under Nadella, Microsoft has embraced Linux. This is in far contrast to his boss Steve Ballmer, who once called “Linux a cancer”. In fact, Nadella is widely remembered to have stood in front of a display saying ‘Microsoft loves Linux’ in September 2016. The acquisition of Github for $7.5 billion is another case in point.

7.Sheds bully image

Microsoft was once the bully pulpit of the tech world. Today it is considered the benign fellow. As governments across the Americas and Europe mull regulating technology companies, Nadella surprised many by calling for exactly that — regulations. He said there should be “thoughtful government regulations” on facial recognition technology, among others.

8.Tastes moderate success in hardware business

Under Nadella’s leadership, Microsoft has achieved moderate success for the first time in hardware business. In the just concluded second quarter of its 2019 financial results, Surface revenue jumped by a massive 39% this year to $1.86 billion. The big jump can be largely credited to Microsoft Surface Pro 6 and Surface Laptop 2 hitting the market during the quarter. The company also released Surface Studio 2 and Surface Headphones at the same time.